Engineering Students
There will come some days of your engineering student life that you will be fully immersed on an exam.
Full concentration and will even say, “I got this.” There’s a scientific calculator at your palm, and your pen on the other hand.
The test requires so many calculations that your hand is blowing up the buttons as you solve.
You finish that exam confidently only to find out later that you got results you didn’t think you will get.
You thought you did well, having to perform the solutions step by step correctly, but the problem is that you turned up to the wrong answers. And you found out it’s all because of your calculator mistakes.
If you think that you are dumb just because of that, you are dead wrong.
Everyone gets to experience those bad days, but that mistake cannot be frequent.
You can blame yourself though, but definitely not the calculator as it only processes the values you put there.
You are the negligent one, truth be told.
What might have happened is that you are so engrossed by the time limit that your hands are already scrambling with the buttons of the calculator, thus making a small mistake.
It could be that your concentration was hindered while placing the values.
Or you suffered from the difficulty of the exam that affected your accuracy of input in the calculator.
Don’t feel bad about it anymore and just move on!
Learn from that mistake and make amends with your calculator for blaming your own mistake to that poor device which is only doing its job.
Just double check your work next time, that will make the difference.
Some errors that you will experience in the future.
Round Off Error and Limited Precision
(10^ 15 + 7.2 − 10^ 15) * 100
Approximating a Derivative Numerically
Approximating an Integral Numerically
Numeric Solver
Find a root of y = x2 using your calculator’s numeric solver. (MATH 0 on the TI-82/3)
Hidden Graphic Behavior
A CAS Error
Engineering students, try limit(sin(x+1/x)-sin(x),x, ∞).
The TI-89 returns undefined.
The correct limit is 0. The TI-89 doesn’t expand the trig function when evaluating limits.
If you repeat the example this way: limit(tExpand(sin(x+1/x))-sin(x),x, ∞), you’ll get the correct result.
More Common Input Errors in Calculator
Common Input Errors with Your Calculator that You Probably Didn’t Notice
Why Engineering Students Hate Losing Their Scientific Calculators
